Education in Psychology
By John M. Grohol, Psy.D.

There are
many educational options to choose from if you want to enter into a career in psychology.
Unfortunately, virtually all of them require more than a Bachelor's degree in order to do anything
truly interesting in psychology. An undergraduate psychology degree qualifies you to work as a
laboratory or research assistance, and in some places, a low-level staffer in a mental health
clinic or facility (you will not be seeing patients).

While a Bachelor's degree is the foundation of your education, a whole new set of really interesting
and fun career opportunities open up once you've decided to continue
pursuing your psychology education in graduate school. Whether you opt for a Master's
or doctoral degree, you will have many more career options in psychology once you've
made the decision to continue pursuing your education.

Master's Degrees for Counseling

Lots of people opt for a Master's degree in counseling -- which makes a lot of
sense if your goal is to offer psychotherapy to clients.
With a Master's degree, you learn everything you need in order to be
an effective and inspiring therapist, but without the hassle of
a dissertation and less focus on doing research. For most people who
want to become a therapist, this choice makes perfect sense.

Master's degrees can usually be completed in just two years. Spending
less time in school means not only can you get out into the field to
begin practicing sooner, you'll also have a lot less student debt to worry about --
a big concern in today's educational environment.

Psychologists Have Doctoral Degrees

Only professionals nowadays who go on for their full doctorate degree can call
themselves "psychologists." If that's important to you, then your decision is made for you.
If the title is less important, you have more options open to you, because Master's degrees
require less money, less time, and less training and allow you to do a lot of the same
kinds of things as a doctoral-level person can -- most importantly, psychotherapy.

If, however, your interest is more along the lines of research, the doctoral degree is
the easy and obvious choice. Specifically, you'll want to find a Ph.D. program that
you can get into and afford. This path is also the one to choose if you're interested
in teaching full-time. If you're interested in teaching only part-time or at a local
community college, however, any graduate degree in psychology will suffice.

While once the gold standard of the psychotherapy profession, the doctoral degree is no
longer considered required in order to become a competent and good therapist. If your
career path is decidedly set on doing psychotherapy, you can still pursue a doctoral
degree. But be careful in racking up expensive student loans if you take this path -- most
therapists' salaries haven't risen nearly as quickly as tuition has in the past two decades.
This trend is unlikely to change anytime soon, because less people see out psychotherapy too.

Psychologists Generally Can't Prescribe Medication

If you want to be able to prescribe medication, psychology is the wrong field to pursue.
Medical doctors do most of the prescribing of medications in the U.S., so you'll want to
look into becoming a psychiatrist -- a medical doctor that specializes in psychiatry.
This requires all the same training as any doctor receives -- medical school, residency, etc.

Don't rely on psychologists seeking prescription privileges either. That's a slow train
that's been on the tracks for decades now, with only two states who've signed on-board
(and only because of a dire lack of alternatives in those states).

Consider Alternative Training Programs, Online Programs

There are a wealth of options nowadays in order to obtain a graduate school education
in psychology, ranging from professionals schools to online universities. These options
make graduate training more readily available to ordinary people than at any previous time in the
history of psychology. Carefully consider such programs, especially if you find little
luck in being accepted at one of the few slots available in a traditional Ph.D. academic
program.

One thing to be aware of if you pursue a professional school or a private university that
has a larger Psy.D. program is the issue of educational loan debt. These schools can often
be significantly more expensive than a traditional Ph.D. program, and it is becoming not
uncommon for students to graduate with 6 figures of graduate schoold debt. This is
a significant issue, even if you don't think it is right now. Most people's careers
in psychology simply don't make sense if you start out with 6 figures of loan debt.

To put
this into perspective, this is the same amount of loan debt many medical doctors graduate
with -- but they often start out at 6 figure salaries too! Psychologists never start
out with 6 figure salaries, and will be lucky to obtain such a salary within the first
20 years of their career (in most positions in most places in the country).
So carefully think twice before agreeing to sign on to a program that will likely
require you to go into debt beyond $100,000.